Sometimes, I see a hockey card and I’m pretty sure that I’ve seen the same photo elsewhere before. I might have to rack my brain for a bit and page through my binders of hockey cards until I find a match. Heck, that’s the whole premise of Deja Vu Tuesday. But other times, I see a photo on the hockey card and can instantly recall where it was first used. Such is the case with this card of Andrei Lomakin.
Lomakin, who played four seasons in the NHL, is shown here with Dynamo Riga — a team that is now part of the Kontinental Hockey League, but back then was a part of the Soviet Championship League. From 1976 to 1991, teams from the Soviet Union toured North America annually and played against NHL teams in what was called “The Super Series.” Numerous players from those Soviet teams were featured in O-Pee-Chee’s 1990-91 Hockey set, including Lomakin.
What is interesting to note is that Lomakin actually played for Dynamo Moscow while in Russia, but was a part of the Dynamo Riga team when they toured North America. The picture of Lomakin used on his 1990-91 O-Pee-Chee Hockey card was taken in Dynamo Riga’s game against the Minnesota North Stars on January 7, 1989.
A year later, Star Pics used the same old picture on their card in their 1991-92 Draft Picks set. Surely, there had to be another picture of Lomakin from the Super Series, or from the Olympics or another international tournament. Heck, even a photo from the NHL Draft — with the Flyers logo airbrushed out for licensing reasons — would have at least been appropriate. Instead, Star Pics decided to use the same photo used by a competing card company a year earlier.
What Star Pics should have done was take the photo that was used on the back of Lomakin’s card and use it on the front. The picture on the back shows Lomakin as a member of the Soviet National Team, complete with the imposing “CCCP” logo. That would have been way cooler — and way less redundant — than something we all saw a year before. ■
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aww man Lomakin! i got his auto on a team photo one game in philly he was injured and they randomly had him at a booth behind my section in the Spectrum. It was my first official autograph from a player and i treated that thing like a mickey mantle rookie card! memories!